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1964: "Passage of the Civil Rights Act"

Explore how President Johnson used his powers of persuasion and political skills to convince legislators to vote for the controversial Civil Rights Act of 1964, in this video from American Experience: “1964.” Despite resistance from a solid block of senators from the Deep South, who had successfully used the filibuster to prevent civil rights laws from being passed for nearly 100 years, Johnson was able to find enough votes to pass a law that would end segregation in public places. This resource is part of the American Experience Collection.

It was the year the Beatles came to America, Cassius Clay became Muhammad Ali, and three civil rights workers were murdered in Mississippi. It was the year that students at UC Berkeley rose up in protest, African Americans fought back against injustice in Harlem, and a conservative revolution took place in the Republican Party. In myriad ways, 1964 was the year when Americans faced important choices: between the liberalism of Lyndon Baines Johnson (LBJ) or Barry Goldwater’s grassroots conservatism, between support of or opposition to the civil rights movement, between an embrace of the emerging counterculture or a defense of “traditional” values.

On the political front, seismic change could also be felt. At his commencement address at the University of Michigan, LBJ called upon the graduates to help him build a “Great Society” and used his legendary powers of persuasion to engineer the passage of the landmark Civil Rights Act of 1964. But even with such a historic federal commitment to advance the cause of equality, racial unrest, in both the rural South and the cities of the North, would continue to fester and eventually explode.

During the summer of 1964, Martha Reeves’s hit song “Dancing in the Street” became an unexpected anthem for a nation in the midst of radical social change. In June, nearly 300 students and veteran civil rights activists joined together to launch Freedom Summer, a nonviolent campaign to challenge Mississippi’s voter registration laws. On June 21, three of the young activists—two whites from the North and a local black volunteer—went missing. While the search for Andrew Goodman, James Cheney, and Michael Schwerner continued for six weeks, the killing of a black youth by a white police officer in Harlem triggered civil unrest and looting that shocked the nation. The violence by whites that had characterized race relations in the South was now being expressed by the black community, angry and impatient with the slow pace of civil rights reform.

On August 4, 1964, the bodies of the three Freedom Summer volunteers were finally found. As classes began at UC Berkeley in the fall, hundreds of young people, including many Freedom Summer veterans, started to demonstrate on campus for racial justice in the Bay Area. When the university administration tried to crack down on the students, the Free Speech Movement was born. The Berkeley protests were a spontaneous expression by a generation of affluent young men and women who, for the first time, began to flex their political muscle and demand a seat at the table. Their nonviolent, highly organized, grassroots style of protest would become the model for student protest and student activism that would reverberate throughout the decade.

In November, Johnson was elected president by a landslide. But his fight for civil rights in the South transformed the previously Democratic region into a formidable bloc for the emerging Republican right. In the years to follow, LBJ’s dream of a Great Society would be shattered by the long and divisive war in Vietnam. Out of the ashes of Goldwater’s defeat, conservative young Republicans regrouped, determined to claim the White House.

Even as the idealism and enthusiasm of 1964 were reshaped by subsequent events and personalities, the nation could never go back. This pivotal year heralded a tumultuous change in every aspect of American life—a transformation that would spread throughout the world.

Historian Robert Dallek calls the Civil Rights Act of 1964 a “huge political gamble” for Lyndon Johnson. What does Dallek mean? What might Johnson and the Democrats have lost by passing the bill? What might they have gained?

Writer Rick Perlstein calls Johnson’s powers of persuasion the “Johnson treatment.” How did this contribute to the passage of the Civil Rights Bill? Why did Senator Russell feel that the “solid core” of southern senators could have resisted Kennedy on civil rights but were not as effective with Lyndon Johnson? Would such tactics work in the Senate today?

Imagine that the Civil Rights Act did not pass in 1964. What might have happened to the civil rights movement and the fight for equality?

The year 1964 was a pivotal one in American history. As Americans emerged from the trauma of President’s Kennedy assassination, the status quo seemed to be shifting on every front: social, political, and cultural. This video is part of a series of media resources from American Experience: “1964.” Use it on its own or in conjunction with others from “1964” on PBS LearningMedia (see "You Might Also Like") to begin a study of the 1960s or to focus on a specific trend or issue. For further information, see Related Books and Websites.

Before watching the video, you may want to review the following vocabulary: stranglehold, Deep South, vulnerabilities.

What was segregation? What did it mean to “end segregation in all places of public accommodations”—restaurants, swimming pools, bus stations, train stations? Where was this kind of segregation legal? (You may want to have student locate the “Deep South” on a map of the U.S.) Why was this provision so important to the civil rights movement?

Have students research the filibuster. What was it? How was it used? How had it had been used by southern Democrats to block civil rights legislation for nearly a century? What controversies have surrounded it in recent years?

Ask students to create a diagram analyzing the demographics of the Senate and the House of Representatives in 1964. Have them pay particular attention to the state and party affiliations of its members. Now have them compare their diagram to today’s Senate and House of Representatives. How has this changed since 1964? Ask students to explain the reasons for that change.

The issues surrounding civil rights resulted in an extremely polarized Congress—a label often applied to Congress today. Have students research landmark legislation passed in 1964 and 1965. What enabled Congress to pass such measures in the 1960s as opposed to Congress’s lack of action today?